Inter-Tidal Zone

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Creatures You’re Likely To See:

Chiltons / Armadillos

Chitons are ancient slug-like creatures with 8 overlapping shell plates along their backs. these are surrounded by a tough girdle, armed with scales, hairs or spines. the head is hidden under the girdle and has no eyes or tentacles. The rest of the underside is a broad, muscular foot, which sticks firmly to the rocks.

Please don’t try scraping them off the rocks. They too, are sensitive to air and sunlight and are found under rocks and in crevices. They creep along, rasping encrusted plants and animals from the rocks with a strong file-like radula / tongue. Seven different kinds can be found! Chitons / Armidillos are used for bait and often eaten by the local people, although it is very tough.

Sea Stars & Cushion Stars

Starfish have 5 legs, each one with its own breathing, digestive and reproductive organs. A groove, running from the central mouth on the underside down each leg, protects rows of hydraulically operated tube feet-turn it over and watch the tube feet squirm! Most starfish are predators, but cushion stars are vegetarians, which feed by pushing the stomach through the mouth and plastering it into the rock to digest tiny algae. Dwarf cushion stars lay eggs under rocks, which hatch directly into tiny starfish.

Mussels

A pair of shells that are hinged together along the back, by an elastic ligamnet, protects the mussels. This stretches when the mussel clamps shut (when touched or exposed to air) and springs them apart when the animal relaxes. They feed by sieving water through big sheet-like gills. Most of the body consists of the reproductive organ (orange in females and white in males) which sheds enormous numbers of eggs and sperm into the water. Mussels are eaten by Spiny Starfish, Musselcracker fish, Black Oystercacher birds and of course, man. The Mediterranean mussel was introduced, from Eurpoe, to be raised commercially.

Other Creatures You’re Likely To See:
Periwinkles Limpets Seaweeds Sponges ‘Sea Firs’ / Hydroids Moss / Lace animals Flatworms + Nudibrach Bristle + Musselworms Fan & Tube worms Marine Springtails Shore + Sea spiders Shore crabs	Shore crabs Hermet crabs Soft + Hard corals Giant Periwinkle Klip / Rock fish Octopus Feather + Brittle Stars Oysters Top Shells Red-bait / Sea Squirts Zoanthids Sea Fans